Hallmark Movie Review: Right in Front of Me

Image via: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/right-in-front-of-me

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

I’m a die hard Pretty Little Liars fan, which by proxy makes me a Janel Parrish fan 🙂 I was dying to see Janel in a RomCom role and I’m super happy she didn’t disappoint. She’s adorable!

Now that you know about my girl crush on Janel, we need to talk about her movie costar. Who is Marco Grazzini and why haven’t I noticed him before? He was super cute in this movie. His role was perfect and I hope Hallmark pairs these two again!

Movie Re-cap

Carly (Janel) is a Bridal Stylist – not to be confused with a wedding planner. Say what? I didn’t know a thing like this existed. A bridal stylist ensures everyone wearing a dress or tux is wearing something they love and look great in, but she doesn’t get involved in the wedding details or designing the wedding itself.

Nick (Marco) is the chef at the hotel Carly is spending the weekend relaxing at with her friend.

Unbeknownst to Carly, there is a wedding happening at said hotel and the women she went to college with are all there for the wedding. Carly winds up helping the bride with some stylist tips and is invited to the wedding and wedding activities.

Carly finds out her college crush, Matt, is also in town for the wedding. While Carly explores what could have been she also finds out what could be with Nick.

My Two Cents

For the second week in a row, Hallmark hits the spot with a movie that you can turn on and watch any time. There’s nothing new or different about this movie. It’s a classic Hallmark RomCom, but these two have good chemistry and the movie is cute.

There were a lot of parts I enjoyed, but my favorite was probably when Carly convinced Nick and Matt to do the chicken wing challenge. While the two men were practically in tears from the heat of the wings, Carly gloatingly consumed hers to beat the challenge. This was so great!

Oh and Nick remembering to include the tiny fork with Carly’s dessert? Be still my heart! Men like this are keepers! They will always want to make you happy and they will remember these little things that make you happy. When you find a man like this, you hold on tight 🙂

This isn’t going to be one of those movies that you love so much you tell every person you know, but it will be one of those movies you are happy to watch and re-watch when ever you can. I hope you give this a try and enjoy it! Happy movie watching y’all.

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Movie Review: Fit for a Prince

Image via: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/fit-for-a-prince

Rating:

If you follow this blog and you’ve read my other Hallmark movie reviews, then you’ll know I don’t normally tear apart Hallmark movies. I accept them for what they are…often repeatable plot lines that have feel good endings. But this movie? It missed just about every mark.

If you’re thinking to yourself, Jamie just doesn’t like Royal movies. Not true! I love Royal movies. I always wanted to grow up, meet a secret Prince and be whisked away to a life of luxury. Just ask my parents.

If I like royal movies, then why did this movie fail to make a passing grade? Lets start with the obvious…

The lead character’s name is Cindy. Cindy – a nickname for Cinderella. Cindy is the head seamstress, who is hired to design gowns for a royal ball. There are even two girls referred to as evil step sisters (Brooke and Julia) who try to sabotage everything Cindy does.

This is setting up to be a cute Cinderella parody. So why not continue the theme? Why not add an evil step mother, fairy god mother, dropped glass slipper, horse drawn carriage, or play with character’s names like they did with If I Only Had Christmas?

While I mostly missed it the first time, If I only Had Christmas was a parody of The Wizard of Oz. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Wizard of Oz, so I noticed a few of the nuances, but the second time I watched it, I noticed a whole lot more. And they were really well done! This movie? *SMH* HALLMARK you need to commit like you did with If I Only Had Christmas or give Cindy a new name.

That’s enough time droning on about Cinderella and The Wizard of Oz.

There were also several scenes that I’m sure were suppose to be funny, but they fell flat. There’s one where Cindy is trying to get into a building and the security man keeps asking her the same questions repeatedly. I’m sure it was suppose to be funny, but it was just ridiculous. He asked the same exact question repeatedly and she was talking perfectly clearly.

Maybe it would have been better if we had heard and saw what the security guy heard/saw? I’m not sure, but I guess he must have heard her eventually, because the next thing we see is Cindy walking down the hallway to meet with Gloria.

And that ending! UGH!! **Spoiler Alert** Partnership? PARTNERSHIP?! Cindy accepts a partnership when she could have her own brand/company?! Why??? I was really lost on that one. Plus, what’s going to happen when she’s whisked away to be with Prince Ronan?

Then there were the nit picky items like fake British accents, bra straps and bras showing way too often, and multiple awkward moments added to my already failing opinion.

Overall, I can’t recommend this movie. If Hallmark had fully committed to a Cinderella parody, it could have been great, but they didn’t. So, here we sit disappointed in what could have been. Hopefully next week’s movie will be better.

In the mean time, here are a few of my favorite Hallmark Royal movies that I hope you can find somewhere to watch: A Royal Christmas, Crown for Christmas, One Royal Holiday, etc. Happy movie watching y’all!!

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Movie Review: It Was Always You

Image via: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/it-was-always-you

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Lizzy, I love you! You’re cute, quirky, organized, awkward, and most importantly…you love lists!

My family has often joked that I’ve had a list since the day I was born. They weren’t wrong. The most recent list looked something like:

Graduate college
Find a job
Marry an awesome man
Buy a house
Have Dogs
Have Kids

List making fills my soul with happiness. And yup, I’m doing good with my current list, but that’s not why we’re here…we’re here to talk about this movie!

Lizzy’s list making makes it seem like George would be a good fit. George is Mr. Safety man. He’s risk averse, which makes everything he does predictable and reliable and easy to plan, but also incredibly boring and dull.

I LOVED his reaction to having Oysters! Oh George, so predictable. Of course you wouldn’t eat oysters. Of course you would wonder how many people die from eating raw Oysters per year.

FYI – Google says about 100 people per year die in the US from eating raw oysters.

List makers and organizers DO NOT need Georges in their life. They need people who will help them let go, laugh, dance, be spontaneous, and forget their lists – but only sometimes because sometimes lists are necessary. List makers need someone like David!

David who pretended to pass out due to a peanut allergy. Who tells you you’re a neopolitan sundae. Or takes blame for something he didn’t do to protect Lizzy. Or keeps a rabbit foot as a reminder of the girl he secretly loves. List makers need Davids in their life.

It’s no surprise then that David and Lizzy wind up needing to plan her and George’s wedding and in doing so, Lizzy realizes what she’s missing in her relationship.

There were so many cute jokes and scenes in this movie! Oh, and the music! Hallmark has really upped their music prowess this year. You are So Beautiful is one of my favorite songs. Jeff and I sing it to our dog Ella all the time.

Overall, this movie is really good and sweet. The ending had a little “Arg! Why’d you do that?!” moment, but I’m going to forgive it. I get why they did what they did. Even though it wasn’t how I wanted to see it play out, it still had a Hallmark happily ever after. Give this movie a try y’all! Happy movie watching!!

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Movie Review: Beverly Hills Wedding

Image via: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/beverly-hills-wedding

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Lost loves/second chances. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this before…I have a thing for lost loves and second chances. I didn’t know this was going to be one of these movies! What a happy surprise!

Childhood sweethearts galore! Jordan + Sofia and Cory + Molly were all childhood sweethearts, but Cory and Molly grew apart as they grew older. Over the years, Jordan and Sofia grew closer and become engaged in the beginning of the movie. Molly, a photographer and Sofia’s sister, offers to be their wedding planner.

Molly knows Sofia and Jordan are on a budget, so she enters them into a free wedding contest in Beverly Hills, and she wins! This earns a free planning trip to Beverly Hills for the foursome. The catch? The wedding is pre-scheduled to be on Valentine’s day, which is only 6 weeks away. Will the shortened engagement pull Jordan and Sofia apart? Or will being in close quarters bring Cory and Molly together? Watch and see!

Here’s my two cents. Fair warning, there will probably be a few spoilers.

First, lets talk about the leads.

Brandan Penny isn’t one of the leads that typically makes me drool or fantasize about being stranded on a deserted island with (sorry Brandan!), but dang – I could get lost in those blue eyes! Do they do extra touch-ups on his eyes during his movies or are they that beautiful? I could lose myself in them for days.

Equally as impressive as Brandan’s eyes was Brooke’s hair. I wish I had her stylist! In the era of COVID hair, Brooke is my idol! Plus, her outfits were adorable. She always looks so classy!

I think we’ve established that both leads are beautiful in their own right, but together, they’re fantastic. This was a great Hallmark pairing. They had beauty, chemistry, and bantered very well. Plus, you found yourself wanting them to be together. I think I actually moaned at one point when they almost kissed, but at the last minute, Molly pulled away shouting, “Seating charts!” Ugh! Molly!

Don’t worry though folks, because this is Hallmark. And in being Hallmark, of course there are happy endings for everyone. BUT…I did need a few tissues. Maybe I’m just hormonal or maybe the ending was that good. You can be the judge. Either way, I definitely had tears during the speeches at the end of the movie. They were so sweet and perfect.

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Movie Review: Snowkissed

Image via: https://www.hallmarkchannel.com/a-winter-getaway

Rating

I was really excited to watch this movie from the first preview I saw a few weeks ago. I adore Jen Lilley. Although I need to say that I prefer her with darker hair instead of blonde. But regardless of hair color, she made this movie something special.

I love quirky women and Jen’s character, Kate – or as I call her – always play it safe Kate is definitely quirky. See, Kate is scared of living, so she stays in New York and never ventures outside city limits. In fact, she doesn’t like being country quiet, being outside, and her version of rock climbing is in a temperature controlled building with ropes and safety precautions abound.

However, Kate needs to travel to Canada to visit with an Author for an article she’s writing. While there, she makes plans to stay at Noah’s B&B. Unfortunately, Noah’s business isn’t doing well, so he’s decided to expand into giving tours. He asks Kate and Jen to take a 3 day adventure tour and provide feedback on his tour giving abilities.

Boy oh boy does Kate give Noah feedback! She’s ruthless. LOL. Now granted, Noah did need some serious help. He was horrible, but with Kate’s help, he finds his stride in being a tour guide and Kate finds her stride in living life.

I loved this movie for several reasons. If you want to analyze this movie, it had many life lessons. One of the biggest being not to waste life. Don’t be afraid to experience life and don’t be closed off to new opportunities. Sometimes we put blinders on and forget to take them off to see what else is out there. GIVE NEW EXPERIENCES A TRY! You never know what you might end up liking.

Another reason I loved this movie was that it made me laugh…A LOT. Noah’s ridiculous jokes even had my husband laughing (shhhh…don’t tell him I told you all that he was watching this with me or that he ENJOYED IT!).

I was just reminiscing about the beautiful herb garden I had when I was growing up. Good thymes.

Why do melons have weddings? Because they cantaloupe!

What do sprinters eat before a race? Nothing, they fast!

I only picked 3, but if you click them, they’ll take you to another 100+ jokes I found on bestoflife.com. Hehe. Check them out! Also, check out this movie! It was definitely worth watching. For those of you who like sales, you’ll love this! It’s like a two for one, because Kate’s photographer also has a little romance going on. Happy movie watching y’all!!

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